3 days in Poland has given me a small taste of life here and has allowed me to get to know my distant family. My father passed away when i was only 14 and therefore I never knew the Polish side (the Szulc part) of my heritage. My only knowledge was that as depicted in movies (eg the Pianist)
My aunty and my cousins family have played host for us for the last 2 days and while we had a huge language barrier (thank goodness for my two youngest second cousins who know English) we still managed to communicate. And eat.. Ahh the Polish love to cook and eat and we did over and over again! My cousin’s wife Anna made the most amazing food in abundance (we actually ate from 3pm and didn’t stop till 8pm!!) and apart from eating comes the drinking (Polish beer & Vodka is good!!!).
Hardest emotionally of all was spending time with (and ultimately saying goodbye to) my Aunt, who is the only sister of my deceased father, and my cousin Ryszard. We wanted to say so much to each other, my only thought now is to learn Polish as quickly as possible and return to talk further with them.
We now continue our holiday, appreciating life even more and yet I feel like someone has flicked a switch and I have a family once again. I leave Poland tomorrow a totally changed person.
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